


Tumble Down Through the Years, My Love

by die_traumerei



Category: Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Awesome Peggy Carter, Bisexual Bucky Barnes, Bisexual Peggy Carter, Domestic Bliss, F/M, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Multi, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Steve Gets Used To the Future, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Steve Rogers and the 21st Century, Steve explores his sexuality, Threesome - F/M/M, Vee to Triangle, a bunch of retirees and their houseplants, the opposite of canon-compliant
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2020-02-08 14:03:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18624739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/die_traumerei/pseuds/die_traumerei
Summary: So here's the deal: after Cap goes into the ice, Peggy gets the serum.In the seventies, she also gets Bucky.By 2014, she and Bucky are semi-retired and frankly enjoying the hell out of life, their marriage, and the world in general, what with the no more brainwashing, SHIELD basically in okay, non-Hydra-infiltrated shape, and the Obama administration.And then everyone learns that you can thaw Steve Rogers out of his ice block and after a quick blow-dry and a change of clothes, he'll basically be up and moving around, and everything gets considerably more interesting for everyone.Including the problem of where to find a bed that fits the three of them.Some adventure, more domestic bliss. There's gonna be way more words about houseplants than about Nazis, and Steve couldn't be happier about this.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I swear I started writing this before Endgame! It's less a fix-it for that, and more a way to re-write a story that is less splodey, but provides rather more emotional support for Steve. And Bucky. And Peggy, for that matter. Also I get to indulge in a lot of domestic bliss with a side of adventure-when-they-want it.
> 
> One quick note -- I'm experimenting with writing this in present tense which is pretty new to me. I think I've caught all the places I bollocksed up tense, but if something sticks out to you, don't hesitate to flag it!

The good thing about being a living legend is, no one is even a little surprised when you show up unannounced at the government (well, government- _ish_ ) agency you co-founded. They don't squawk, or get nervous, or call their superior, and the superior, once summoned, doesn't demand how you know something so top-secret the name of the clearance to learn it is top-secret. It's so _refreshing_ , Bucky thinks, as he and Peggy are led down a bright corridor. Nearly as refreshing as the air-conditioning that makes the heat of a DC summer, just on the other side of that glass into a thing he knows about but does not in any way have to experience himself. The future's just the best, really.

“Director Fury will be with you in a moment,” says the woman who did not even flinch when they showed up and politely asked what they had politely asked. Bucky likes her. He makes a note of her name and number, and he'll write her a thank-you note and get her a raise later. He _loves_ doing shit like that.

He and Peggy sit in the comfortable chairs and pretend to admire the view. Peggy is, Bucky sometimes feels, less good at relishing the whole living legend thing, but this time she sits quietly right next to him.

Bucky reaches for her hand, curling his fingers softly around hers. “Hey,” he says quietly. “English. He's gonna be so happy to see you.”

Peggy looks over at him. “And you.”

Bucky shrugs. “I guess. I think mostly he'll be surprised to see me.” He stops smiling and squeezes Peggy's hand. They'll have something in common, him and Steve. They'll both be meeting someone they thought was dead.

Peggy turns her hand and lifts Bucky's fingers for a kiss, just before Nick Fury let himself into the small room.

“Directors,” he says, nodding to them. They were directors emeritus really, and definitely retired except for the really fun parts or missions they _really_ wanted or, of course, the annual holiday party, but Nick was being very nice. It wasn't going to work.

“Director,” Bucky says dryly.

“Are you done with your psychological cruelty?” Peggy asks sweetly.

Nick Fury sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. Bucky decides he will feel sorry for the guy in about six weeks, after he and Peggy have swept Steve away and given him a gentle introduction to the world and made sure he's had enough to eat and maybe some nice books to read. Then he will be able to really deal with the man before him – his hand-picked successor! It's not that he thinks Nick does a bad job! – without losing his shit because Nick Fury was unimaginably cruel to Bucky's best friend who isn't his wife.

“You know I had to see what kind of man came out of the ice,” he says.

Peggy and Bucky grunt in surround sound.

“He was completely safe the entire time,” Nick says.

Peggy and Bucky blink at him.

Nick throws up his hands. “Look, I needed to be sure! Now I'm sure that the man next door is Steve Rogers and that he's as smart as you both have sworn he is, and as suspicious.”

Peggy rolls her eyes so hard Bucky winces a little in sympathy. He also appreciates that Nick Fury isn't a stupid man, and he can take Peggy's hand and head for the door.

“Thanks for trying,” he offers. “Oh. Has Steve been told to expect us?”

“No, I was gonna let his dead best friend and barely-aged girlfriend walk in when he was expecting someone with a cup of coffee and a cookie for him,” Nick says, and Bucky is filled with a rush of warmth for this sarcastic asshole.

“Well, we know you're busy, dear,” Peggy says, and pats his hand, and Bucky is pleased yet again that she had agreed to marry him. What a lady.

They'll give Fury more shit later for being an asshole to an actual American hero/Steve who admittedly often deserved a little asshole but not like  _this_ and not from  _Nick Fury_ who had never not even once had to pull Steve out of a fight by the back of his collar. For now, they leave the room and walk the short distance to the next door up the corridor. 

Steve was behind the door. Steve, unfrozen, alive. Steve who had run out onto Times Square yesterday, confused and scared, and Steve, who they would be taking home with them to New York and no one could stop them.

Bucky and Peggy stop in front of the door and look at each other. They reach out and hold hands tightly.

“Oh shit,” Bucky whisper. “You think he knows about my arm?”

“I think he'll be too busy looking at your you,” Peggy whispers back. “But put your hand in your pocket just the same.”

Bucky nods, a little glad she's afraid too, and he leans in to kiss her. Then Peggy opens the door.

 

Steve hasn't aged a day. Well, of course not; you couldn't age when you were frozen solid and probably technically dead, and he looks so  _bewildered_ , Bucky's heart falls out of his ass and twenty floors down to the lowest basement.

Steve's eyes narrow.

“It's us,” Peggy says quickly. “I promise, Steve. I _promise_.”

“That's what they tell me,” Steve says slowly.

“It's us, darling,” Peggy says, her voice thick. Bucky movs his hand to the small of her back, and gives her a little push. Peggy still young and beautiful is a little impossible, but Bucky the ex-brainwashed assassin (and okay, still young and beautiful and alive) is extra-impossible. 

Also, if Steve knows he's alive, he knows  _why_ Bucky is alive, and probably what he's done and who did this to him and just...if he 's afraid of Bucky, or suspicious of him, Bucky doesn't want to know. Not right now. Better Steve have an uncomplicated welcome.

He should have let Peggy do this alone.

The old fears; Bucky should have kept running and never let anyone love him. He should be paying for what he did in misery and solitude, like that would somehow even the balance. Bucky breathes deeply, and Peggy stops in her tracks and turns around.

“James Barnes, don't you _dare_ think what I know you're thinking,” she says using his whole government name, hands on her hips. “Fuck sake, man, get over here.”

Bucky smiles weakly at Steve, still all the way across the room. “Hi,” he says, and Steve's face does a thing.

“It is you,” he says, and stands up, and holds out his arms. Bucky hesitates for a second, but no, that wide embrace? That isn't just for Peggy and anyway she's using all of her serum strength to drag him the few steps to Steve and into his arms.

He and Peggy fit in Steve's embrace, and what the actual fuck. This is how it should  _always_ have been, and he presses his face into Steve's shoulder and hugs back with all his might, one arm around Peggy and the other around Steve. They should have always been three, but they are now, and they can hold Steve between them. Show him a new world, the way Peggy had helped Bucky become himself again. They could do anything they wanted.

The hug lasts a long, long time, long enough for all three of them to cry a little, and hold onto each other, and let the tears dry. Finally, though, they ease apart just enough, though Bucky keeps his hand on Steve's waist. He can feel body heat with the metal hand, and the pressure of Steve's back, and is intensely grateful for the improvements on this latest iteration.

“They said you were alive,” Steve says. “I didn't want to believe.”

“I don't blame you one bit,” Peggy says, and wipes her eyes. “Nick's not usually this much of a moron. Oh, Steve.” She wraps her arms around him again. “You owe me a dance.”

Steve smiles weakly, and hugs her back. “I know. Sorry I'm late.” He looks over her shoulder. “Buck, you wanna try teaching me again?”

Bucky makes a sound that is supposed to be a wisecrack but Steve is  _alive_ . Stevie is alive and well and in front of them, walking and talking and with his arms around Peggy like it had been no time, and Steve maybe is okay with Bucky?

Bucky takes a deep breath and tries again. “Course I do. Twelfth time's the charm, right?” He winks, and puts his hand on Peggy's arm. “Hey Stevie. They also tell you that Peg and I live in Brooklyn, and we got a place for you there? If you wanna.”

Steve's eyes get wide. “ _No_ they did not, and Jesus fuck, no, I wanna keep living in a weird beige room surrounded by people I never met who look at me like they're scared I'm gonna grow another head or re-freeze or something. When do we go?”

“Right now, if you want,” Bucky says. “I'll take care of, um, arranging transportation. I'll just...step out.”

“You'll do no such thing,” Peggy says. She gently steps away from Steve and walks over to Bucky, folding him close. Poor gal, Bucky thinks, she shouldn't have to do this for both of them. “I don't win because I kissed him,” she says with her usual blunt-force trauma methodology.

Bucky maybe understands Nicky Fury a little bit now, but just a little. To be clear.

“Uh,” Bucky and Steve say.

“You don't get out of this,” she says. “Steven, tell Bucky you're happy to see him.”

“Bucky, Peggy says I'm happy to see you,” Steve says on cue, and they look at each other and Steve all but crumples. “Buck, I saw you die,” he says in the rawest voice Bucky has ever heard, and he's at Steve's side without really moving, wrapping his arms around his best friend and holding him so tight it almost hurts.

“I'm not dead and you aren't either,” he manages, digging his fingers into Steve's shirt, trying to hold onto him forever.

“You're alive,” Steve repeats, his hand on the back of Bucky's neck. “It's all okay. Everything's okay.

“Did they tell you...”

“Yeah,” Steve says softly. “You lost your arm. It doesn't matter Bucky.”

Bucky blinks a little. “Oh, that. You're right, it doesn't – I mean, it does, but it's okay. No. I just. I. Wasn't...me. For a long time.”

“Don't care,” Steve says firmly, almost cheerfully. “You're you now.”

Bucky can  _feel_ Peggy smiling triumphantly, so he serves her right by crying a little on Steve while she makes arrangements for the short flight to bring Steve home.

 

Steve doesn't exactly have anything to pack up, and Bucky and Peggy had arrived just long enough to yell at Nick and collect Steve (and not spend time outside ugh the  _city_ is built on a  _swamp_ ugh), so they all pile into a helicopter provided by SHIELD for a blessedly quick trip back to New York.

They've just entered airspace over Maryland when Steve finally clocks that they're both wearing wedding rings. Or, rather, Peggy has a wedding ring and Bucky has a beautiful incised band around his metal ring finger.

“Oh, you're married,” Steve says. “To each other?”

“To each other,” Bucky confirms. 

Steve goes  _white_ . “Oh shit,” he says. “And I had my hands all over-- oh God, I'm so sorry--”

Peggy holds up a hand and Steve goes quiet. Bucky turns to her, overwhelmed with envy. “How do you  _do_ that?” he hisses.

“Not the time,” she says sweetly. “Steve. Stop. Before you can even start. Don't apologize, not for anything.” She pauses and swallows. “Steve, you're _alive_. I think I can get a hug.”

“Same,” Bucky says quietly. They can explain 'monogamish' to Steve later. Possibly they will also explain 'so Bucky's actually bisexual' later too, although Bucky is not sure that will be anything other than of academic interest to Steve. He can see Peggy being the point of their vee, but he can't quite believe in a triangle.

Steve looks less certain than the two of them, but mostly he looks wide-eyed and overwhelmed and nervous, and fuck. Bucky just wants to wrap around him and tell him it'll be okay. That the future's awfully cool, and that he'll be safe and happy and welcome. That he doesn't have to fight anymore. (Bucky and Peggy saw to that.)

Peggy, the brave one, reaches out and takes Steve's hand, squeezing it, and he squeezes back. An automatic motion, one that makes Bucky warm inside. (He cannot conceive of being jealous of Steve. He was, once, right after Steve rescued him. It was a strange five minutes of his life, before he came to his senses again. Besides, Steve and he needed each other, serum or no.) “We'll tell you the whole story, once we've landed and I've made tea and we're somewhere less...military-industrial complex,” she says, wrinkling her nose and waving around them.

“What did they tell you, though?” Bucky asks. “Uh. Other than we're both alive, and...un-aged.” They look pretty young, maybe early thirties, he reckons. They are not young at all.

Steve looks at him, eyes a little hungry. Well, of course – he had mourned Bucky, and here's his best friend right in front of him. Changed, but alive, and Steve doesn't seem to mind one bit. “Not much more than that,” he says. “Peg, they said you go the serum – that that other allied nations had been working on similar programs, and were able to collaborate with Howard after the war.”

Peggy nods. “It hasn't worked for anyone else,” she says quietly. “But it worked on me.”

Bucky slips an arm around her shoulders and kisses her temple, his magic girl. She's had hard times with the serum. Well, they all have, he reckons. “One exception to that,” he teases, and she gasps and her hand flies to her mouth.

“Shit, Bucky! Of course. I meant after me,” she explains, and laughs, and pulls him in for a kiss. “Okay, it worked for him too,” she tells Steve, pointing to her husband.

Steve nods sadly. “Azzano. They did things to you, didn't they?”

“Yes,” Bucky says quietly. “I think it only worked on me – there, I mean. Everyone else died.”

Steve takes a very deep breath. “Oh, Buck,” he says. “I'm sorry. I should have...” he holds his hands out helplessly. “Done something. Anything.”

“There _was_ a war on at the time,” Bucky says gently, and catches Steve's eyes, and smiles. “Pax. You gave me a purpose and men to lead and a you to herd around. You did things.”

“Not enough,” Steve mutters, and Bucky can't help but smile. Their Stevie's really back. His dead friend is not dead any more.

“Did they tell you much about Bucky?” Peggy asks gently.

Steve shrugs. “Probably not. That you were captured by the Soviets, and brainwashed, and we rescued you in the seventies.”

“ _Peggy_ rescued me,” Bucky says.

“ _Bucky_ rescued himself,” Peggy says simultaneously, and they grin at each other, Bucky leaning in to give her a quick kiss.

“Anyone ever tell you you're kinda stomach-turning?” Steve says, and Bucky falls over laughing. It's not _that_ funny, but it's his Steve.

“No,” Peggy says primly. “We're the love story of the century. But yes, this one--” she gives Bucky a hard poke in the side – “came home in '72. It took a little while, but our Bucky came back from all of that.”

Bucky smiles at her. She'd been tenacious while he healed physically, and then healed as much mentally as he ever would. Then they'd been tenacious together.

“We'll help you,” Bucky says softly. “It's hard. I won't lie, Stevie. It's gonna be so much harder for you than it was for me, in some ways. But you're gonna be happy again. I _promise_.”

“I'm not alone,” Steve says simply. “So it'll be okay.”

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

They land close enough to their house that they can walk home, despite the very fancy black car waiting outside of the abandoned hospital/SHIELD facility. Peggy speaks to the driver for a few moments while Bucky enjoys not being in DC and Steve takes in the world around him.

“I do like it when Nick apologizes, but it's such a lovely day,” Peggy says, returning to them and slipping her arm into Steve's while the car pulls away.

“Not bad for the middle of summer,” Steve agrees, smiling at her, then he looks around for Bucky.

“Right here, pal,” Bucky says softly, touching Steve's back. “We'll trade off halfway there.”

It's maybe a little mean, and Steve probably isn't expecting 'trade off' to mean Bucky takes  _Peggy's_ place, slipping his arm in where hers was and delicately resting metal fingers on Steve's arm. Bless him, though, Steve recovers immediately with a gallant smile – and a little squeeze, to bring Bucky just a smidge closer.

Feeling not unlike the belle of the ball – and  _feeling_ Peggy snickering to herself – Bucky sails them both up the steps to the brownstone he and Peggy bought back when it was sinfully cheap, and have slowly spent decades fixing up and changing and redecorating. 

The hall is simple, the bannister and trim still early-20 th century, and Bucky feels Steve relax just a touch. “Welcome home,” he says simply, and turns, and Steve is already moving in for a long hug, holding out an arm for Peggy.

“Thank you,” he says thickly. “I dunno how I'll repay you for this, but I will. I couldn't live in that gray room anymore.”

Peggy hugs him so hard Bucky's ribs hurt a little in sympathy, and he rubs Steve's back. “I'll show you the spare bedrooms while Peg puts the kettle on,” he says. “You can have your pick.”

Steve smiles with suspiciously bright eyes. “Spare  _rooms_ ?” he says. “Boy, I gotta fancy coupla friends.”

Bucky laughs and leads him up the stairs. “Our bedroom's at the end of the hall,” he says, pointing. “Peg's office is there, bathroom's there, and here's option one.” He takes Steve into the room. It's small and plain, and looks out over the street, but there are huge trees that screen the view and fill the room with greenish light. There's a bed with a simple coverlet and an old dresser, comfortable battered wood. There's a small closet, and not much more. “We could probably squeeze in a tiny desk if you wanted,” Bucky apologizes. “The others are a little bigger.”

Steve's eyes are pretty big themselves, but he follows Bucky up to the top floor. They emerge onto a similar landing to the one below, though there are skylights here. “Bedroom, bathroom, my office, bedroom,” Bucky says, pointing at the doors around the landing.

The first bedroom is similar to the one downstairs, though it features a cat asleep on the bed.

“Well, hello,” Steve says softly. “Puss puss puss.” He scritches the head of the giant orange cat. “What's her name? Or his, I guess.”

Bucky shrugs. “I honestly don't know. She comes in when we leave a window open, I think she belongs to a neighbor.”

Steve smiles, and Bucky thinks this room might win, until they check the other bedroom. It's over his and Peggy's, and it's big enough for bed, dresser, desk, and an easy chair in front of one of the windows. The view is of their little garden, and a Tree of Heaven, and Steve sighs happily.

“Oh, Buck, are you sure? It's huge.” He turns around, looking around him. The walls are painted the palest shade of rose, the floor old polished wood, and there's a ceiling fan turning lazily in the afternoon sun. They can hear a bird, and a lot of traffic. The furnishings are simple wood, and Bucky reckons the desk was an antique when they were all young. There's lamps and framed prints, but nothing that screams twenty-first century.

“Steve, you could sleep in a different room every night, and I'd be happy,” Bucky says gently. “Whatever you're most comfortable with.”

Steve sighs. “This feels like too much,” he admits. “But I like it.”

“I like it too,” Bucky says. “And look.” He grins at Steve and takes him over to the closet. Just looking inside, it's got some boxes – he'll have to store those someplace else – but seems unremarkable until Bucky turns to the left inner wall, and shows Steve the hidden door.

Steve laughs, utterly delighted, and Bucky opens it up to another closet, this one a little more full. There's room for both of them to squeeze through, though, and into a bright room full of monitors and old computers and new computers and a workbench at one end full of electrical bits and soldering equipment. A lot of things are blinking. There is a painting on one wall of a wizard. Bucky copied it off one he saw on the side of a van once.

Bucky feels no need to mention that this is his office, since he feels it's pretty self-evident.

“Buck,” Steve says sincerely. “You haven't changed a bit.”

 

Bucky's still cackling when he takes Steve downstairs to their crowded little kitchen. There's plants everywhere, and the giant orange cat has followed them too, sniffing curiously at Steve.

“I know,” Bucky says sympathetically. “He smells like a big jerk.”

“I smell like a government institution,” Steve corrects, wrinkling his nose. “I need a bath.”

“We'll get you towels and things,” Peggy promises, dumping a box of cookies onto a plate. “Tea's up, lads.”

“Bless you,” Bucky says, pulling down three mugs from their Mug Cabinet. (This is after the latest 'we own maybe too much stuff' cull. In their defense, they have a lot of people over and also a ton of storage.) “Stevie, milk, sugar?”  
“Uh, both please,” Steve says. “Buck, I can get tea for myself, I'm already puttin' you two out...”

“Don't be a dockle,” Bucky says.

“Yeah, you're really putting us out, taking up an empty room,” Peggy says. “Steve, sit and eat a cooky.”

“Yes ma'am.” Steve sits and eats a cooky, because he knows what's good for him.

The tea is hot and good, just the thing to revive him, and he sits at the table and sips in between bites, and the sugar and the caffeine and the sensation of sitting in a warm kitchen, watching Peggy clear the dish rack and Bucky settle down in the other chair, easy as can be – all these things meld together, and Steve smiles so big it hurts.

“Better than SHIELD, huh?” Bucky asks.

“You have no idea,” Steve says fervently, and then his eyes widen as he works out that Bucky probably _does_ have a good idea, actually. “Oh, shit,” he says. “I didn't mean...”

Bucky smiles, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. “It's okay,” he says. “You'll hear the whole long story someday.” Nick'll probably do something totally brilliant and not at all harmful by just tossing his file at Steve, next time he thinks it would help.

Too bad Peggy will have gently filled Steve in on Bucky brought in in restraints, Bucky who didn't know who he was, all blood and black leather and confused rage. Bucky cannot talk about these things very well, but Peggy can.

“Hm,” Steve says. “When you're ready,” is his only comment, and he sips his tea, gazing around him.

Peggy settles down between the two men, watching them both thoughtfully, trying to see her kitchen through Steve's eyes. Drying flowers and herbs hung whenever there's space. An old oven and stove, but a new refrigerator. All of them sat at a rough farmhouse kitchen table in chairs they bought in the sixties. They've re-caned the seats, but that's it. A mishmash of decades, she decides, cupboards painted different colors as the spirit and the time took them, but everything clean and lived-in.

“Everything looks different, but not,” Steve finally says. “That's an icebox,” he said, pointing at their fridge. “I think?”

“Yeah,” Bucky says. “We, uh. We're a pretty good cross-section of sixty years of design, actually.” He shrugs and pulls out his phone. “I hope you got the 2014 101 talk?”

“I know what that is, yeah,” Steve says, pointing to the phone. “And basically how to use one.”

“You should have a phone of your own,” Peggy muses. “We'll sort that out.”

“I should? Why? I don't need to call you two, I live with you?” Steve asks. “Uh. Right?”

“Right,” Bucky says firmly. “You're not a prisoner here, though, Stevie. You wanna move out, we'll help you do that too.” No one will ever be forced to be in his home, not even his best friend. He sort of hopes Steve will stick around, though. For both their sakes. Peggy was the best homecoming he could've asked for, but she didn't always understand when he got a little unstuck in time. Bucky thinks he maybe could be good for Steve. That both of them could, in their own ways.

Steve shakes his head. “I won't wanna move out,” he says, low and stubborn.

“Good,” Peggy says. “I like having you here.” She smiles at him until he smiles back, wide-eyed and unsure of himself. “And I'm sorry, I should explain. Calling someone is like...maybe one percent of what I use my phone for?” She laughs and pulls hers out of the back pocket of her jeans. “Look, it's more like a tiny computer. You can look stuff up real easy – did someone explain Google to you?”

Steve shakes his head, watching her closely as she does a nice, innocent search for cute dogs. “It's an awful small screen.”

“You get used to it,” Bucky advises. “It's real good if someone catches you out on something – way easier than going to the library and checking the encyclopedia.” He grins. “Not that that wasn't fun too, but I spent a lotta time wondering who the fuck Chubby Checker is.”

Without missing a beat, Steve takes Peggy's phone and learns who the fuck Chubby Checker is.

Bucky grins and grins at him, so much his face hurts. “Steve,” he says. “Steve, you're gonna love it here.”

Steve kind of squints at him, and offers a tentative smile back. “It's something,” he says.

 

Steve pretty well moves in by virtue of being in their house – he's got nothing to unpack or anything, but he helps Bucky clear out the closet in his bedroom. “I got a stupid amount of clothes,” Bucky says. “So I can lend you pajamas or whatever, until you get your own clothes.” He looks Steve up and down. “We're about the same size, I guess, and I got a lotta big shirts and things that'll definitely fit you.”

“Thanks, Bucky,” Steve says, looking around the sunny bedroom. There's distant music playing, something reggae, and Bucky is consumed with the urge to hug Steve again, to try to show him that it'll be okay. Somehow get it into his head that he's home and safe, and Bucky and Peggy will help him get used to this new world. That he'll get used to it all faster than he'd ever believe right now.

He doesn't want to push things, though, so he gently walks Steve into the bedroom he shares with Peggy and looses him on his wardrobe and bureau.

“I can run out tomorrow and get you clean underwear, and we'll start from there,” he promises. “You can wash your drawers in the sink tonight and they'll dry.”

Steve smiles a little at that. “Huh. Some things don't change, y'know?”

“They don't,” Bucky agrees. 

Steve moves mechanically, picking out soft clothes to sleep in. Bucky does not punch the air with glee when Steve picks out Bucky's favorite red henley, and probably the biggest sweatpants he owns. His guy's gonna be warm and comfortable at night, at least.

Steve isn't his guy, Bucky reminds himself, and already knows this is going to be a hard thing for him.

He grabs a few pairs of pants, mostly understated navy or black. The look he gives Bucky's collection of skinny, form-fitting trousers is one for the ages, and Bucky has to smother a giggle. Wait'll Steve sees him in leggings going to the gym. A few t-shirts and a button-down round out the Shopping in Bucky The Clotheshorse's Closet Shared Group Activity, and they go back upstairs to put everything away. Bucky grabs a new toothbrush and some toothpaste out of their bathroom, and fresh linens, and the bedroom feels at least slightly lived-in, once everything is in place.

“The walls,” Bucky says, looking around. “They're bare.”

“I guess?” Steve looks so overwhelmed even just by this, that Bucky decides its time to rein himself in, and pretty sharply too.

“Never mind,” he says. “I'm sorry, Steve. Never mind what I said.” Steve has food and water, a safe place to sleep, and good clothes to wear. They'll build on that, but that was all Bucky needed to start, and it'll work for now. He takes a deep breath. “Hey. Wanna raid our bookshelves?”

That gets him a response, a whole smile just for him. Growing up, Bucky had always been the reader, but Steve wasn't any kind of slouch, and he follows Bucky happily to their living room, where Peggy's curled up with a cup of tea and her laptop.

“Hi boys,” she says, not even looking up. It's all complete theatre on her part – Bucky can see how her eyes tense, and the set of her shoulders, but after decades together, you get each others' tells down pretty good, he guesses. He predicts crying together later, and wanders over to kiss the top of her head. He loves her more than he ever dreamed possible, and she looks up and smiles at him.

“Hey kid,” he says softly, and chucks her under her chin. When Peggy's being brave, she likes his forties-style flirting.

“Hi old man,” she says back, and he drops down to join her on the loveseat, while Steve blushes furiously and purposely turns to the huge wall of bookcases.

Peggy still works – and it is work, Bucky notices, and he debates reminding her that they're semi-retired, but it's distracting and normal and frankly gives her something to do other than stare at Steve hungrily, which is what Bucky wants to do with every fiber of his being. He's not even being cheeky about it; his  _best friend_ is back  _from the dead_ and Bucky wants to cry and throw a party and open a bottle of champagne and immediately do everything with Steve basically acting as an extra appendage, the way they used to.

Instead he puts his head down on his wife's shoulder and closes his eyes and does some very quiet breathing exercises.

 

Steve politely but firmly insists on helping with dinner, and he quickly learns his way around their kitchen, and also what a microwave is. He laughs and appreciates it when Peggy admits that they still have to light their stove by hand, and that it's basically an antique with zero safety features. Bucky sets him to chopping stuff for a fancy salad; it might not be DC but it's still summer, so they opt to cook as little as possible, just caramelizing some cherry tomatoes from their little plot in a community garden.

“What do I have to do tomorrow?” Steve asks after he's learned what quinoa is.

(Bucky and Peggy enjoy taking on the mantle of their perceived age no matter what decade they live in. The late seventies had been  _awesome_ . Bucky's chest hair had finally fully grown back by then and he worked it.)

“Whatever the fuck you want,” Peggy says.

“Retirement is _great_ ,” Bucky agrees. “Honestly. I gotta go weed our garden plot and I'll get you some underwear of your own, but do what you like.”

Peggy nods. “I have a Krav Maga class at six,” she reminds Bucky. “I'll bring a pizza home with me.” She explains Krav Maga to Steve. And pizza. (The pizza is described with, frankly, a lot more glee and detail.)

“Uh,” Steve says. “I guess.” He looks at them both and swallows hard. “Bucky, can I come with you? I gotta get used to things, might as well start tomorrow.”

“Of course,” Bucky says. “Anything you want, buddy.” Bucky will do anything in the whole world to ease that lost, scared look out of Steve's eyes. He knows it from the inside a little too well. “We can pick you up some other stuff you'll need too, if you wanna.”

Steve shrugs, and it clicks into place. Bucky _really_ knows what his friend's dealing with, and it breaks his heart.

“Hey Stevie,” Bucky says. “SHIELD's gonna offer you a therapist, someone to talk to about all the shit going on in your head. You don't have to, but it really, really does help to talk to someone.” Also, not in the least bit surprisingly, Steve is depressed. Bucky thinks maybe Steve was always depressed, he just didn't know how to notice.

Steve's forehead wrinkles. “Like psychoanalysis?”

Peggy snorts.

Bucky sighs. “Not exactly. I mean, yes, but only broadly. Freud is not what you'd call in fashion these days.”

Bucky had been psychoanalyzed. Fresh out of brainwashing. It hadn't gone well, although that wasn't the poor guy's fault, he just did not in any way have the tools to deal with, well, Bucky. Things were better now than when he'd first come home and he and Peggy had to muddle through.

Steve shrugs. “If you say it's worth it, I'll go.”

“Go, and see what you think,” Peggy advises. “Sometimes you have to try a bunch of people. But it's really, really worth it.” She sighs, and smiles at Bucky, and leans in to kiss him. “This one needed help no one really knew how to give him, and I'll never stop being sorry for that. Let us help you Steve, okay?”

Bucky wraps his arms around Peggy, his gal who took on way way too much in the world. “Hey, I got by in the end,” he says. “I was free, and safe, and eventually healthy again.” He grins and tickles Peggy with his metal fingers. “Got a new arm, got a wife, got a house...”

Peggy laughs and shoves him. “Bucky, you're unbearable.”

“I coulda told you that,” Steve says, utterly deadpan. “You married him, you got no one to blame but yourself, Peg.”

Bucky might laugh a little  _too_ hard at that, but he's not fussed; this is Steve peeking through the shell-shock. His dry, sarcastic, whip-smart friend is still there, the way Bucky was still there under the Winter Soldier.

Peggy's giggling too, and both of them are probably staring at Steve like he's all their Christmases bundled up together. (And they have a  _lot_ of Christmases between them.) They don't mean to be creepy but. Well. Yeah.

 

They hold it together – all three of them – through dinner and getting ready for bed and making sure Steve is comfortable in his room and has a pile of books and knows he can come get either of them anytime, for anything.

“We did some pretty hard-core soundproofing,” Bucky tells him. “Like, mostly super-soldier safe. So we, uh, won't hear you. Unless you come get us.”

Steve nods, sitting on the edge of his bed. It's big and Bucky knows for a fact just how comfy it is, (He's like a cat with naps, and his office is  _right_ next door.) Steve is sitting very gingerly, looking a little too big for his limbs.

“You gonna be okay?” he asks softly.

“I think I can survive the night,” Steve says, and smiles up at him. “I'm gonna be okay, Buck. Promise. Go to bed.”

Bucky nods, and pats Steve's shoulder, and goes to bed. Well, to his bedroom, and he lies down on his bed with Peggy. She puts her magazine aside and turns to him.

“He's good?” she asks, and at Bucky's nod, starts to weep.

“Hey, love,” Bucky whispers, and pulls her close so she can cry into him at least. “Peg, he's _alive_.”

“Yeah, I know, that's why I'm cryin',” she tells his chest, and Bucky makes a choking sound and starts to weep a little himself. His best friend who he isn't married to is alive and back and maybe fifteen feet away from Bucky himself right now? He'll see Steve tomorrow morning. Maybe they'll have coffee together. Steve didn't die under the ice. Well, he did, kind of, but he's back now, and it's gonna be hard but he's got Bucky and Peggy, and won't ever have to do any of this alone.

Bucky hugs Peggy tight, because she had to do this all the long way. Sure when he had died-but-not, it didn't hit her so hard; but when Steve died...

He'd once shyly asked her if she missed him, after he fell from the train.

“Yes,” she had said. “I liked you. And you kept Steve grounded, and real, and you were his friend.” She had even blushed a little. “I was sad, Bucky, but I think I missed you more for Steve's sake than my own. And then Steve...”

Bucky had loved her honesty from the start.

He shakes off the memory; it's the present, it's 2014, and Steve Rogers was thawed out, wakened, and traumatized by SHIELD. And Steve Rogers is currently asleep (Bucky hopes) in his spare bedroom, on a warm summer night. 

And Bucky loves him so, so much, he can't even breathe his hope for the future, not even to Peggy. Not yet.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Bucky wakes up in his usual conjugal pretzel. Both he and Peggy are not what you'd call calm sleepers, which is a  _good_ 60% of the reason they've never shared a lover – some things are just cruel to put another person through. This morning, overcast and humid, he's lying at an angle across the bed, his face shoved into Peggy's stomach. She's tangled in the light summer duvet, her arms splayed like angel wings and one foot somehow resting on his metal shoulder. 

He kisses her soft belly and extricates himself, then kisses her for real.

“Mornin',” she mumbles.

“I'll bring you coffee,” Bucky promises, and smiles when she affectionately whaps him on the arm in thanks. “Love you, Peggy.”

This wakes her up, although Bucky's pretty sure no one would believe that Peggy goes so gentle and soft for anyone, even him.

“C'mere,” she murmurs, and pulls him down for a long hug and a soft morning-breathy kiss. “Love. Bucky. My Bucky.”

Bucky smiles at this and holds her close, their bodies easing together. He wonders how long they'll be together. Maybe centuries? He likes the idea of centuries.

“My Peg,” he whispers, and kisses her throat, soft and sleep-warm. “I'll be right back, sweetheart.” He holds her just a little longer, because she's a gift he never expected, and finally gets out of bed to go make coffee.

He finds Steve already in the kitchen, making coffee on the stove in their old pot. “Morning,” Bucky says, as his heart does a funny thing. A series of funny things, if he's being accurate. He quietly ignores it; it's just butterflies because Steve is suddenly alive and _in Bucky's kitchen_. It'll pass.

“Morning, Buck,” Steve says, and smiles at him. “Coffee's up.”

“You're a saint,” Bucky tells him. “Enough for two?”

“Peggy drinks coffee now?” Steve asks, a little surprised. “Uh, and, I mean, yes, there is.”

“Yeah, she picked that one up real fast,” Bucky says, pouring out two mugs and doctoring them appropriately. “Even before I was a bad influence. Be right back, Stevie.”

He delivers Peggy's coffee for when she's a little more awake, and heads back to the kitchen, taking a seat across from Steve.

They catch each other looking up and smiling, and Bucky has to laugh a little at the two of them. “I'm sorry, just...”

“Yeah,” Steve says. “Bucky, you're alive.”

“Look who's talkin',” Bucky says, and he thinks he might never stop smiling. Steve's across from him, sleepy-eyed still and in Bucky's borrowed clothes, and real as anything. “Steven Grant Rogers, back in my kitchen, drinking my coffee, just like always.” He shuts up quick, then – that's a lot of old buddy sarcasm for first thing in the morning.

Steve just grins wider, though. “You're the one that invited me,” he points out, and Bucky laughs with joy that this is definitely his friend, back and in the flesh.

“Someday I'll learn better,” he agrees, and they sip their coffee together, falling into comfortable silence. Bucky is unspeakably pleased that they're still...them. It's been three months for Steve and forty-odd years for him, and they are themselves nonetheless.

“Hey Buck?” Steve asks shyly. “Can I see your metal arm?”

“'Course you can, buddy,” Bucky says, a little surprised. He reaches his arm out across the table, and even hitches his sleeve up a little, to show his shoulder.

“Is this the one you had when you, uh.” Steve looks at him, and Bucky grins.

“When I came home?” he offers. “Nah, that was...a lot of generations ago.” He smiles when Steve touches a very gentle fingertip to the back of his hand. “You can touch, you won't hurt me. I did have a metal arm from the Soviets. The whole thing – it's. Uh. A part of me now.” He'll show Steve his scars another time. “But Howard's son makes the new ones now. I've had to limit him to once a year, I got better things to do than be in his lab every other week.”

Steve nods, taking all this in, looking exactly like a captain taking on what his sergeant tells him. Bucky notes that this doesn't cause his heart to hurt. This is them, too. “You can feel this, right?” Steve asks, tracing the ribbon of metal across the back of Bucky's hand.

“Uh huh. I can feel pressure as good as with my right arm,” he confirms, and turns his wrist over, metal fingers fluid and easy. “This arm's stronger, and it's not invulnerable but you gotta work pretty hard to damage it. I can't much feel texture or temperature, though.”

Steve nods, his fingertips resting on Bucky's palm, their fingers nearly interweaving. “Does it hurt?” he asks quietly. “To have it a part of you?”

“Not really. It's better now that I don't really fight. And better with the newer generations – since the nineties, really. Before that they were really heavy, and that sucked.” Bucky smiles, catching Steve's eye. “It's not so bad. Pretty handy most of the time. Uh. So to speak.”

Steve rolls his eyes, but his smile is deep and warm. Bucky presses his fingers around Steve's, just for a moment, then withdraws his hand, and they return to their quiet coffee.

Peggy emerges as Bucky is making a pile of cinnamon-raisin toast, and he greets her with a kiss and a stack of the fragrant buttered stuff.

“You eat too,” Peggy mumbles, shoving the topmost slice into his face as she yawns.

“I'm next,” Bucky promises. Steve is already halfway through his stack-- good. Bucky's family will be well-fed.

“Morning Peg,” Steve mumbles, clearly not sure where to look, and Bucky realizes that Peggy is wearing shorts and a sleeveless top and, Forties-wise, is definitely in her underwear in the kitchen.

She blinks, and smiles at him, startling and clear and stunning. “Morning, Steve. Oh, shit, yeah.” She gestures at herself. “Modesty standards have changed.”

“And here I thought I was gettin' a special welcome-home show just for me,” Steve says, deadpan.

Peggy grunts. “One, you wish. Two, no wordplay for the lady this early.”

“Peggy is not a morning person,” Bucky helpfully supplies.

Steve looks surprised. “Really? You were, uh, back. When I met you,” he tries, and Bucky thinks they're gonna need to figure out a whole vocabulary. Sometimes he thinks he and Peggy are aligned, understand each other, catch the changes in the world together. And sometimes he thinks they're on two different timelines still; Steve will add a third. Well, they'll figure out how to work with it.

“There was a war on,” Peggy reminds him. “Different time.” She yawns enormously, and takes an equally enormous chomp of her breakfast.

Bucky sneaks a few more slices to each of them, and finally sits down with his own breakfast when Steve gets a look on his face like he's thinking about being Captain-y and grumpy at Bucky. Bucky would like to see him just  _try_ .

But later – for now, the three of them breakfast together in the muggy summer air.

 

Peggy disappears after breakfast – and a sleepy kiss with Bucky – to finish waking up with her cup of coffee in the quiet of her office.

“We'll let you know when we go out,” Bucky promises.

He and Steve linger a little over their coffee. Steve, who very carefully did  _not_ look at Peggy and her short shorts leaving the room, gazes a little curiously around him. Bucky thinks he feels more grounded today. Good – he wants to get this uncomfortable as hell conversation over with early.

“Hey Stevie?” he says quietly. “There's something I should tell you.”

“Yeah, Buck?” Steve asks, his attention snapping away from the thermometer still mounted just outside the window over the sink.

“You should know – I'm queer,” Bucky says, all in one big breath. This isn't a new discovery, but it's the first time he's told Steve. Thanks to his wikipedia page, it's the first time he's had to tell almost _anyone_ in a long time.

Steve wrinkled his forehead. “But you and Peggy...”

“Bisexual. That's what they call it now,” Bucky says. “Men and women both.”

“Oh,” Steve says. “Well, all right Buck. Long as you're happy.”

Bucky tries to exhale quietly, at least. What, did he think Steve was going to react in disgust? Not his Steve, not ever.

Instead Steve looks thoughtful, and he smiles when he catches Bucky looking at him. It's easy for Bucky to smile back, to find ease again in drinking coffee in a sunny kitchen, Steve right across from him, alive and healthy and whole.

Bucky had planned a slow, easy morning, just let Steve into his new life gently. Maybe sit in the back a little, on their patio. But Steve starts to get jittery pretty soon, and Bucky remembers who he's dealing with. Steve does not do slow and easy. Ever.

He tactfully ends breakfast by going to get dressed, lets Peggy know they're heading out as promised, and grabs their bag of garden stuff – maybe working in the community gardens will be good for Steve? It's a Wednesday morning, so it'll be quiet, anyways.

Steve's just a few minutes behind him, looking mildly uncomfortable in sweatpants, a t-shirt, and an old pair of Bucky's sneakers. Lucky they're about the same size, Bucky guesses. They've caught up with each other: first it was Steve, skinny and short, then when he got big Bucky was still on the skinny side himself, not helped much by war rations. Now they've both got big shoulders, frames padded out with muscle. Peggy does too, for that matter; the three of them will be a sight together.

Bucky quietly evicts the mental image  _that_ thought brings on, as a promise of something that will never be. Instead he smiles at Steve, shoulders the garden bag, and they head out.

Bucky reckons that taking Steve to a Target might actually be in contravention of the Geneva Convention, at least right now. Also, it's a fucking schlep to get to even a small one. Lucky for them both, there's a small drygoods store not far away. Everything it stocks has a misspelled brand name, you can buy tamales in the back, and the only soundtrack, ever, is Celia Cruz. Bucky loves it more than his own home most days, and he cheerfully takes Steve there to pick out some packs of underwear and t-shirts, a couple pairs of shorts, jeans, and some Adidos track pants. He picks up an extra pair of those for himself, feeling strongly that he needs a little nod to his time in Eastern Europe. Also some tamales for later.

“We can have them for lunch,” he tells Steve, who is clutching a bag with his new clothes. “You'll love 'em.”

“Uh huh,” Steve says. He's looking a little wide-eyed, but is standing pretty relaxed. About as relaxed as a guy who was, effectively, in the US Army in 1944 this time last week can get. Small stores with a variety of goods, some of which fell off the back of a truck, is pretty familiar to them both, at least.

 

Tamales gotten, everyone thanked, it's on to gardening, Bucky navigating them through the city streets. Brooklyn's changed around them in ways he doesn't particularly love – gentrification is bullshit, and he's pretty clear on that to everyone – but he knows where to find the variety, and the really old things, and he tries to take Steve by them, to show off place he still loves after all these decades.

Steve takes it all in until they get to the community garden, and Bucky and Peggy's plot. (Bucky's plot, really. Peggy is not the gardening type, a fact that makes Steve smile when Bucky mentions it.)

Steve, it turns out, is also not the gardening type.

Bucky did not even  _know_ it was possible to literally step on a rake and have it whack you in the face.

“Sorry,” Steve says, sitting on the chair Bucky keeps here for pretty summer evenings. At least he didn't break his nose, and there's no bloodshed. “Uh, this'll clear up in a few minutes,” he says, waving at his spectacular black eye.

“I know,” Bucky says, trying not to either hover _or_ laugh. The whack in the face looked painful, but also...Steve stepped on a _rake_.

Steve looks at him, and there's that spark again. The promise that decades won't matter. “It's okay,” Steve says, his grin growing. “You can laugh. That was pathetic.”

Bucky seats himself on the ground in preparation for a really good belly laugh. “The last time I saw that happen was in a cartoon,” he said, and because Steve is fine, really, and also is apparently one of the lost Stooges and  _also_ , did Bucky mention, is alive, he lays down and laughs until he cries.

When he sits up, Steve's bruises are already fading, but Bucky requests that he stay seated (mostly for his own safety), and drink some water from the bottle he brought.

Bucky starts in on some weeding, and of course Steve protests that he should be helping.

“I don't trust you not to pull up the beans,” Bucky says, because he doesn't. “Sit and talk with me, and maybe you can water the flowers when I'm done here.” As one of the founders of the garden, Bucky has a giant plot, and has had it for twenty years; they can sacrifice a few square feet to roses and other pretty things. 

“I can _water flowers,_ Buck,” Steve says peevishly.

Bucky whistles a few bars from  _Star-Spangled Man With a Plan_ , just to get his point across, and starts weeding the corn.

“It's all really different,” Steve says quietly. “Buck, how did you do it?”

“Badly,” Bucky says, because he did. “At first. I don't think anybody can do it well. Peggy's...lucky, in a way. It all happened in real time for her. I don't know everything you're goin' through – 1972 was a lot closer to 1944 than 2014 is, more than just a span of years would imply. But I promise, Steve, you don't gotta do it alone. Not all of it, anyway.”

“Yeah,” Steve says, and it sounds like a sigh. “And...you were brainwashed, right? You had to undo all of that?”

“Yes,” Bucky says carefully. He would give his home and all his money for Steve to never learn what happened to him, _or_ what he did, but he knows it doesn't work that way. They can keep secrets from each other about as easily as the tides can stop happening.

He can  _hear_ Steve set his jaw. “I don't have to worry about none of that,” Steve says. “I got no excuses. It'll be ok, Buck. I'll adjust.”

“Nope. Pause. Stop.” Bucky sits back on his heels, shades his eyes against the sun, and looks up at Steve, pinning him with his best sergeant gaze. “It does not work like that. This is not a competition, and you do not get to decide you've started the race twenty feet ahead. I'm not your excuse to beat yourself up when you take more than a day to adjust to seventy years under the ice, while the world transformed with unprecedented rapidity, got it?”

“Uh. Got it.” Steve smiles weakly. “Shit.”

“Uh huh. You think I'm bad, wait'll you're dealing with me and Peg together. She's an old hand at this now.” Bucky reaches out, resting his hand on Steve's knee. “Hey. We're all in this together, buddy. Just hang onto that, okay?”

“Okay, Buck,” Steve says, and Bucky squeezes his knee. He guesses that at some point he'll stop thrilling inside every time he touches Steve. He mourned his best friend every day for forty years, since he learned that Steve had died just three months after he had. And now. Well – they all have some things to adjust to, he reckons.

When Bucky finishes the weeding – not much, he stops by the garden most days to keep it under control – Steve is, in fact, permitted to water the flowers, dipping the watering can into the big rain barrel. Bucky cuts a few of the nicer roses to take home with them, and takes Steve the long way home. It's a pretty walk, even on a muggy day, and Steve takes it all in, quietly absorbing the sights and smells and sounds of a new world.

Bucky lets them in, and makes a note to find the spare keys for Steve – it's not like he can't go out on his own. And he hopes, suddenly, sharply, that their home will become a refuge for Steve, too. A place in the world where he has always, and will always fit. The surge of emotion is strong and sudden and only barely fades while Bucky gets the roses in water and Steve's away in his room putting his clothes away.

 

Bucky's still at the kitchen table, breathing through some feelings, when Peggy finds him. Her hands are warm and strong on his shoulders, squeezing a little. “Good?” she asks.

“A lot,” Bucky says. He thinks a moment. “Let's call it good, though.”

Peggy leans over and kisses his cheek, and he turns and hugs her, head resting on her belly, her hands in his hair now, scritching and relaxing him.

“Love you,” she murmurs. “My Bucky. I got you.”

Bucky looks up at her. “You love him too,” he says quietly. “How are you okay?”

“Practice. No one-on-one time yet.” She scratches his scalp good and deep, and it grounds him. “You always make things complicated, sweetheart. Steve is alive. He's living in our _house_. Nothing can be bad again.”

Bucky smiles at this and hugs her tight. Decades of marriage, and he loves her more every day. He hadn't gotten it, when his grandparents would say that, but now he really, really does.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There'll be Steve and Peggy one-on-one time soon, I promise! This chapter just seemed to end best here.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> http://dietraumerei.tumblr.com/  
> https://die-traumerei.dreamwidth.org/


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